By Ivan Rahman, MPP 2018 On September 13th, over 100 students packed the JFK Jr. Forum. Okendo Lewis-Gayle, HKS Election Chair, stood tall, in a beige suit behind the podium. He commenced the Kennedy School Student Government (KSSG) election session of 2016. With a radiant smile, he began the night by introducing the candidates competing […]

By Sasha Ramani, MPP 2018 Hong Kong’s Legislative election on September 4th saw newindependence-leaning candidates winning seats in the territory’s Legislative Council (LegCo). Traditionally, Hong Kong’s politics have been divided among the pro-Beijing “Establishment” camp and the pan-Democratic camp. This election saw the new “localist” camp take 6 out of 70 LegCo seats;/. Localists are […]

By David Duesing, MPP 2018 On Monday, September 12, the JFK Jr. Forum received the Academy Award-winning director, screenwriter and producer Oliver Stone in a conversation moderated by a man similarly distinguished within his field, Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist and author Ron Suskind. Stone, the screenplay writer of works such as Scarface and director of myriad […]

By Wei Luo, MPP 2017 On Saturday September 10, students and staff joined with community partners for HKS Serves, the Kennedy School’s signature day of service. The Citizen followed a group of volunteers to the nearby Cambridge Community Center, a non-profit providing after school and summer youth programming. Valentino Robinson, the Center’s Community Affairs Director, […]

  Pitichoke Chulapamornsri (MPP ’17) is the current KSSG student body president. Born in Thailand, Pitichoke worked at Goldman Sachs as an analyst in the Private Equity Group, a fund of funds with exposure to over 500 managers and 10,000 underlying companies before the Kennedy School. He also served under the Thai Minister of Finance, […]

By Alen Amini Harvard Kennedy School MPP1 candidates have spent the past two weeks addressing immigration reform in the United States as part of their first year capstone, spring exercise. Students, in diverse groups of 5-6 first year classmates, are tasked with analyzing employment, family, diversity, and refugee based visa allotments for immigrants seeking legal […]

Adam LaRose and Erika Ferguson The first time we sat in Steve Jarding’s course, we were very inspired by his appeal to the class; he offered a moving story about why we and our fellow classmates should accept the most demanding call to public service: running for office. He was not shy about the fact […]

By Wei Luo On Monday February 22, HKS kicked off its Spring Public Service Week with an evening event featuring Max Finberg, Director of AmeriCorps VISTA. The event was hosted at the JFK Jr. Forum and was moderated by HKS Dean Doug Elmendorf. The conversation started with a discussion of Mr. Finberg’s path to public […]

By Fayrouz Saad, MC-MPA 2015 (To the theme of Fresh Prince of Bel-Air) Now, this is a story all about how Our lives got flipped turned upside down This will only take a minute So don’t you move Here’s the story of the mid-career students at Harvard Kennedy School All around the World born and […]

By Justin Hartley, MC-MPA’ 2015 My Father instilled in me the virtues of public service from a young age. He exemplified qualities I can only aspire to have and taught me that it is a privilege to serve and that resilience – unrelenting determination – can make dreams come true. In 1992 I was an […]

By Denise Linn and Alison Flint, Co-chairs of Tech4Change The importance of technology in government has been vividly displayed in recent public policy debates over everything from cyber security and net neutrality to the failed Obamacare website launch. As a leading public policy school, Harvard Kennedy School (HKS) seeks to prepare future public sector leaders […]